Ansari flies weightlessly aboard the International Space Station. During her galactic travels, Ansair said she remembers watching a lightning storm while listening to music on her iPod. “It was like it was playing to my music,” she said. “It felt like gods are playing, making things happen.”

In 2000, Ansari met Peter Diamandis, the chairman and CEO of the X Prize Foundation, who was working with several other space enthusiasts to make space travel a viable option for private individuals.

“It’s an amazing experience to float freely in space and I don’t think I’ve felt so free in my life,” Ansari said. “It’s hard to describe the feeling, but I was sort of like [in an] out of body experience where you everything that you worry about, everything that makes you you, your home, your memories, your school, your work, everything is right in front of you; you’re out here floating, completely separated from it.”

Anousheh Ansari has photos of outer space throughout her office, a reminder of the time she saw it — right in front of her — from a Russian spacecraft.

“I was crying … it’s such a beautiful sight no matter how many times you’ve seen the pictures and images,” Ansari said. “Seeing Earth from space with your own eyes, it’s really a different kind of experience and it really truly is a humbling experience.”

In September 2006, Ansari was launched into space for an 11-day mission with a Russian cosmonaut and an American astronaut.

Now, after making space travel a reality for herself, Ansari is sharing her story with others and is part of an organization that hopes to put space flight in reach of the public.

Private ventures

The journey was a long road for Ansari, 46, a native of Iran. When she and her family moved to the United States from Tehran when she was 16 years old, she wanted to join NASA but didn’t think it was possible because she couldn’t speak English and wasn’t an American citizen, she said.

Instead, she chose a different career path to help support her family.

When Ansari, her husband, Hamid Ansari, and brother-in-law, Amir Ansari, sold their Richardson company, Telecom Technologies, in 2000, Ansari said she felt she could finally return to what interested her most.

“That was the first time that I didn’t have to think about surviving; I could go after my passion and do what I really wanted to do even if it didn’t make financial sense,” Ansari said.

In 2000, she met Peter Diamandis, the chairman and CEO of the X Prize Foundation, and several other space enthusiasts who she said were looking to make space travel available to private individuals.

Ansari and her family joined forces with Diamandis’ group as the title sponsor, as the Ansari X Prize, in a $10 million prize to build a privately funded spacecraft.

Twenty-six teams from 11 countries competed to build a suborbital ship that could lift off to 100 kilometers in the air twice in two weeks.

In 2004, Burt Rutan, who was funded by Paul Allen, co-founder of Microsoft, won the $10 million prize, and Virgin Group chairman Richard Branson signed on with the team to take the concept commercial. Today, Virgin Galactic, according to its website, has more than 600 private citizens on a waiting list for the suborbital flight.

Opportunity knocks

In 2005, one year after the prize was awarded, Ansari was given the opportunity to shadow another civilian along with a Russian cosmonaut and an American astronaut who were scheduled to fly to the International Space Station.

Ansari packed her bags and headed for Star City, just outside of Moscow, to train with the crew. Three weeks before the flight, she said, the person she was shadowing developed a medical condition that disqualified him from traveling.

At the time, she was preparing to head back to the United States, but the Russian team asked her if she still wanted to fly. If she passed her examinations, she would be eligible to make the trip.

“That’s why I believe that when you really want something, somehow things start happening and aligning,” she said.

Life on Earth

When she’s not working with human resources and financing issues with her North Texas company, Prodea Systems, Inc., or continuing her involvement with the X Prize Foundation, Ansari speaks to children and adults at events such as the 2011 Plano International Festival.

TJ Johnson, who serves as a board member for the Plano International Festival, said Ansari spoke to immigrants participating at the naturalization ceremony the city hosts with the Department of Homeland Security.

“I do remember that Anousheh’s story was very touching. She talked about just being a teenager and feeling isolated … and then coming to understand her citizenship and the privilege it brought to her that she could be and dream to be whatever she wanted to be,” Johnson said. “That’s what America gave to her, so it was just a beautiful thing to hear her talk about her journey and take our audience all the way through where she raised her own hand to swear her oath of allegiance.”

Hind Jarrah, co-founder and former president of the Texas Muslim Women’s Foundation, said she had heard Ansari speak several years ago about her journey to space and was impressed by the Plano resident’s persona as well as her interest in science and advancing space exploration.

“For me, Anousheh stands for everything the Texas Muslim Women’s Foundation stands for: the capable, educated, cultured, resourceful, Muslim woman who really is an asset to her society and who really contributes to making a positive change and a positive impact,” Jarrah said.

Plano neighborsgo editor Elizabeth Knighten can be reached at 214-977-2264.